Concurrent validity of the Preschool Early Literacy Indicators with a New Zealand sample of 5-year-olds entering primary school

Abstract

We examined the concurrent validity of the Preschool Early Literacy Indicators (PELI®) with 105 New Zealand (NZ) five-year-old children entering primary school. PELI® incorporates oral language and emergent literacy tasks into a picture-book that is administered as a shared adult–child read-aloud activity. In this study, PELI® administration and scoring was adapted to NZ English. Correlations and hierarchical linear regression analyses were conducted to assess the correspondence of PELI®NZ tasks with criterion measures assessing related constructs (oral language: Clinical Evaluations of Language Fundamentals-Preschool Second Edition, Australia & New Zealand Standardized Edition; alphabet knowledge: Letter Naming Fluency). Diagnostic accuracy of the PELI®NZ language index composite and phonological awareness scores was evaluated using logistic regression and area under the curve (ROC). Results supported concurrent validity of the PELI®NZ in this NZ sample. Future research should evaluate whether children’s performance on PELI®NZ at school entry predicts later progress in literacy acquisition.